Movie Fights
Movie Fights 'is one of the three main shows on the [[Screen Junkies|'Screen Junkies]] YouTube channel. It is a weekly competition in which three contestants debate topics related to movies. Some episodes include thoughtful pop culture arguments, while others have a sillier, comedic bent. Episodes typical run 60-80 minutes. The show first began production in 2014. Over 200 episodes have been produced. Movie Fights is also available as a podcast. The current host of Movie Fights is [[Hal Rudnick|'Hal Rudnick']]. [[Dan Murrell|'Dan Murrell']] acts as fact-checker, while Danielle Radford is social media ambassador. Movie Fights ''contestants are typically people working in the digital media industry, especially hosts from other Los Angeles-based YouTube channels. Many of ''Movie Fights highest-viewed episodes have featured celebrity guests including actor Seth Rogen, director Kevin Smith and actor Elijah Wood. Watch all episodes of Movie Fights on YouTube Format In its current incarnation, Movie Fights consists of three regular rounds of approximately 15 minutes, followed by a speed round of four questions of approximately 1 minute. Regular rounds Contestants are given the regular round questions ahead of time so they can prepare their arguments ahead of time (Not that they always do!). Contestants know what their opponents' choices will be ahead of time, but they do not know their opponents' specific arguments. Each contestant makes a short opening statement, then the debate is opened up to general discussion. Usually, the host alerts the contestants that time is running out and asks for final arguments. Contestants are expected to do three things: advocate for their own choice, knock down their opponents choices, and defend against any counter-arguments made against them. Speed round In the speed round, the host asks a question and the contestants must blurt out their answers as quickly as possible. Contestants are expected to provide answers to the speed round questions on the spot. Mind blanks are common, but making up fictional movies is totally allowed (provided the fact-checker doesn't catch on!). Whoever speaks first gets 20 seconds to argue for their choice. The second contestant then gets 20 seconds to argue for their choice. Each contestant then gets 10 second rebuttal. Scoring After each round, the judges vote on who has made the best argument. The winner scores 1 point. The first contestant to 4 points wins the game. After all three regular rounds have been played, the contestant with the lowest number of points is eliminated. The top two contestants movie onto the speed round. 'The contestants carry over all points they won during the regular rounds (except tie-breakers). Theoretically, this means that a contestant can be down 3-0 and still win the game by winning all speed round questions. However, in practice, it means that a contestant who has dominated in the regular rounds starts the speed round with a head start and usually wins. Judging ''Movie Fights has three judges - the host (usually '''Hal Rudnick), the fact-checker (usually Dan Murrell), and the social media ambassador (usually Danielle Radford). Usually, the host and the fact-checker weigh in with their views on who made the best arguments. If they agree, they winner of that round is declared. If they disagree, the host asks the social media ambassador to weigh in. In regular rounds, the social media ambassador speaks on behalf of viewers who have voted using the YouTube poll. In speeds rounds, the social media ambassador's decision is based on their own opinion. Judging is based on the strength of the arguments '''presented, '''not the judge's personal preferences about the chosen answers. If all three judges pick different contestants in a regular round, the social media ambassador must also weigh in with their personal opinion to break the tie. Tie breakers In case of a tie at the completion of the regular rounds, the host asks all contestants a question using the format of the speed round - contestants must blurt out their answers as quickly as possible, and they get 20 seconds to make their case and 10 seconds to rebut their opponents answers. The points scored in these tie breaker questions are not added to the overall score. History 2014 - 2017 (Movie Fights: The Original Series) Movie Fights was originally created in response to changes in the YouTube algorithm that favored longer content.Dan Murrell Interview - 1 on 1 with Kristian Harloff 'Podcast YouTube, November 22, 2018 The first ever episode of ''Movie Fights was actually an episode of '''The Screen Junkies Show that functioned as a backdoor pilot for the series. This short video was called "Trivial Movie Fights" and featured two teams of contestants debating one round. After the success of this video, the concept was expanded into the hour-long, multi-round format. Old Movie Fights episodes also included several incredibly nerdy touches, like a mess of comic book action figures on the set desk. The host used a toy version of Thor's hammer, Mjolnir, as a gavel to hit the bell at the end of each round. The series originally had an wrestling-influenced aesthetic which enhanced the absurdity of grown adults passionately debating pop culture minutiae like a competitive sport. Episodes of Move Fights used to have provocative titles, for example, "Does Interstellar Suck?" "Does The Hobbit Suck?" "Will Jurassic World Suck?" "Jurassic World - Fun or Failure?" and "Suicide Squad: Rotten or Fresh?" These titles were irresistibly clickbaity, though they did encourage indignation. The adversarial style of the show was intended to be funny. However, as online fan culture became more toxic, the wrestling-esque "fighting" style began to more closely resemble real-world pop culture wars and sometimes lead to real-world consequences. For example, the highly divisive episode "'Suicide Squad - Rotten or Fresh?"'' lead to one of the contestants receiving death threats on social media. Until his dismissal in October 2017, the host of Movie Fights was [[Andy Signore|'''Andy Signore]]. Andy was often accused of being biased in his judging and all-too-frequently allowing rounds to escalate into screaming matches. According to Joe Starr, Andy's approach to the show "created a toxic audience" where abuse in the comments was common. Many beloved contestants, including Alicia Malone, stopped participating in the show because of this toxic culture. 2017 - Present (Movie Fights: The Next Generation) , Ed Greer and Cucumber.]] In late 2017, after Andy Signore was fired, Screen Junkies ceased production of Movie Fights for two months and burnt copious amounts of sage in the studio. When Movie Fights returned, Screen Junkies changed the style and format of the show in an effort to make it provoke less divisive outrage. This included renovating the set to resemble a generic game show, reducing the number of contestants to two, and requiring contestants to stand behind podiums. Paradoxically, these changes provoked intense divisive outrage. Many fans vehemently and repeatedly demanded the return of the original set, three contestants and chairs. The two-fighter format lasted for just 11 episodes from December 2017 - March 2018. In response to fan complaints, Screen Junkies reintroduced three contestants and chairs. One of the chairs sinks repeatedly, often comically mid-round. If Screen Junkies is too cheap to replace the sinking chair, there's no way they have the budget to renovate the entire set again. In January 2019, Joe Starr wrote this about the less adversarial tone of new Movie Fights: "Proud of where we’ve taken this show. The toxic screaming and clickbait is gone and I think we’ve pulled off something difficult: a show that has something for everyone each week without losing its identity and focus." Another change has been to the comment culture. Now, toxic comments are removed and abusive commenters are banned. Additionally, Screen Junkies started paying contestants to appear (contestants were not paid when Andy Signore was in charge!). Production . Video shows producer Max Dionne and researcher Lon Harris.]] Movie Fights has one producer and one writer/researcher. Movie Fights producers include Billy A. Patterson and Max Dionne. 'The writer/researcher of ''Movie Fights is '''Lon Harris. The writer creates questions based on topical entertainment news stories and movies hitting theaters that week. Movie Fights is streamed live on YouTube on Thursday 4PM PST. In 2015 and 2016, the show was streamed live via the Screen Junkies Plus paid subscription service and then uploaded to YouTube a few days later. Screen Junkies Plus also used to feature a post-mortem-style after-show called After The Fight. Spinoffs and Variations Two official Movie Fights spinoffs have been produced: TV Fights and Gamer Fights. Both versions were originally exclusive to the Screen Junkies Plus paid subscription service. TV Fights TV Fights, hosted by Roxy Striar, debuted in November 2015, and aired live on Tuesdays at 4:00 pm PST on Screen Junkies Plus. Ken Napzok was fact-checker/social media ambassador for the first 50 episodes. Billy Business took on this role staring in episode 51.I got this info from this excellent Wikibooks sandbox. Seriously, it's amazing! You need to go there! It followed the same format as Movie Fights. TV Fights was notable for featuring significantly more female contestants than Movie Fights. Roxy Striar used a toy version of Lucille, Negan's baseball bat from The Walking Dead,'' to hit the bell at the end of each round. When Screen Junkies Plus ended in Jun 2017, TV Fights moved briefly to ''Screen Junkies News YouTube channel. The final episode aired in October, 2017. In 2017, episodes of TV Fights tended to average around 50k views on YouTube. 99 full episodes of TV Fights were produced from late-2015 to 2017. TV Fights returned for one round during the 2018 Movie Fights Live Extravaganza benefiting Women in Film. Gamer Fights ]] Gamer Fights, hosted by Matt Raub, debuted on June 17, 2016 and aired every Friday. The show was made in collaboration with the Smosh Games channel, which, at the time, was owned by the same parent company as Screen Junkies. Gamer Fights followed the same format as Movie Fights. The first six episodes of Gamer Fights were pre-taped. They were fact-checked by Nikole Z. After this, most episodes aired live on Screen Junkies Plus and were fact-checked by Kristen Brancaccio. Starting with episode 6, approximately once a month, episodes were also made available on Smosh Games' YouTube channel. I lifted a lot of these facts nearly word-for-word from this awesome Wikibooks Sandbox. If you want to know more about Gamer Fights, please look at that page. In total, 22 episodes of Gamer Fights were produced, all in 2016. Gamer Fights returned for one round during the 2018 Movie Fights Live Extravaganza benefiting Women in Film. Variations Movie Fights episodes have been made using several special formats, including: * Drunk Movie Fights - The contestants consume copious amounts of alcohol while debating. * Stoned Movie Fights '''- The contestants appeared very chill, but there was no on screen drug use. * '''Weird Movie Fights - The contestants were chosen especially for their ability to come up with creative joke answers. * Last Fighter Standing - The losers of each round are out of the game for good. Only the winner moves onto the next round. New contestants come to the table. Last fighter standing wins. The order that contestants appear is determined by how many votes they get in a pre-show fan poll - popular contestants get the strategic advantage of appearing later. * Speed Round Gauntlet - Similar to Last Fighter Standing: losers leave the table and the winner moves onto the next question. Uses speed round questions. The order of contestants is chosen by the producers. * Debut Deathmatch - All new contestants compete in one regular round each. The winners of each regular round fight it out in the speed round. * ComicCon Fights -''' The contestants compete in heats and the winners of each heat fight in a regular round to determine the overall winner. At ComicCon, the regular rounds are shorter than in the studio due to time constraints. Also, the winners of each round are determined solely by popular vote. * '''Fan Fights - Standard format, but the contestants are fans. * Time Travel episodes - standard episode format, but the contestants maintain the charade that they are recording the episode in the past. Contestants are only allowed to make arguments and pop culture references that someone in that year would understand. Two time travel episodes have been recorded: 1999 and 1994. Both episodes were pre-recorded and released over the end of year break. Time Travel episodes had a very playful tone, and included lots of historical irony. That is, the contestants satirically endorsed choices that were ludicrous by contemporary standards, but would have made sense in the past. See also: vault episode, a page about the similar Honest Trailers trope. Contestants Dozens of people have competing in Movie Fights over the years. Contestants typically consist of Screen Junkies employees and guests, often from other YouTube channels. Regular contestants (past and present) include [[Dan Murrell|'Dan Murrell']], [[Spencer Gilbert|'Spencer Gilbert']], [[Joe Starr|'Joe Starr']], Lon Harris, Hal Rudnick, Mike Carlson, Marc Andrekyo, Alicia Malone, Coy Jandreau, Nick Mundy,' Mark Ellis', Clarke Wolfe, Ed Greer, Sasha Perl-Raver, Trisha Hershberger, JTE, Greg Alba and many others. The show has featured some celebrity contestants including Kevin Smith, Elijah Wood, Tony Revolori, Seth Rogen, Kumail Nanjiani 'and others. The Movie Fights Belt Periodically, contestants will compete in "Title Matches" to win the ''Movie Fights Championship Belt. There is no selection criteria for who is eligible for the belt; it's mostly just based on the producers think are the strongest fighters. Likewise, there is no criteria for how often these title matches occur; it's mostly just based on when the producers feel is a good time to have one. The current Movie Fights champion is '''Dan Murrell. Previous champions include Cucumber, a puppet, and Spencer Gilbert, a human. Movie Fights Live Extravaganza In May 2018, Screen Junkies ran the Movie Fights Live Extravaganza fundraiser benefiting the Women in Film. The epic 3.5 hour show was a veritable Infinity War of over 50 Screen Junkies alumni. It culminated with a puppet, Cucumber, winning the Movie Fights championship belt. He totally deserved it. The Screen Junkies community together raised over $38,000 for charity. #OwlNation and his owl mascot, Percival]] #OwlNation is a running joke that commenced in 2018. During the June 7, 2018 episode ("Movie Fights: Honest Trailers Edition"), host Hal Rudnick 'noted that he was wearing an owl-themed pin while ''Movie Fights writer/researcher '''Lon Harris was an wearing owl-themed t-shirt. Hal then proceeded to jokingly refer to creating an owl-based website with Lon while shilling for SquareSpace. This then transformed into Hal regularly greeting the audience with the line "Hoot! Hoot! Where my owls at?" and calling out "#OwlNation." Hal has also brought a owl plushy (Percival) onto the show many times. Movie Fights viewers have embraced #OwlNation and have sent in photoshopped images of the hosts heads on the owls from Zack Snyder's animated film The Legends of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole during the show. Adherents of #OwlNation call themselves'' "'Ga'Hooligans," a portmanteau of Ga'Hoole and Hooligan. Notes and references See also * '''The Screen Junkies Show * Honest Trailers * Flick Bait * Screen Junkies Roasts * Interns of F.I.E.L.D. * Screen Junkies * Screen Junkies News * Screen Junkies Plus External links * New Movie Fights Playlist on YouTube (includes episodes from 2017 - 2018) * Old Movie Fights Playlist on YouTube (includes episodes from 2014 - 2017) * List of Movie Fights episodes on Wikipedia - A fantastic page that includes the name of every episode, the contestants, the hosts and the winners. Highly recommended. * Wikibooks Sandbox about Movie Fights - Another fantastic page that includes detailed stats and rankings about Movie Fights, TV Fights and Gamer Fights. Highly recommended. * TV Tropes' page about Movie Fights - Another fantastic page that includes short descriptions of dozens of funny and awesome things that have happened on the show over the years. Highly recommended. * Best Movie Fights Moments (2014 - 2016) - 90 minute video originally posted on Screen Junkies Plus. * Movie Fights series page on IMDb - You can rate and review every single episode here * Screen Junkies Movie Fights Wikia - The wikia needs love! Category:Screen Junkies Category:Web series Category:Movie Fights Category:Shows Category:Comedy Category:2010s